News Archives: February 2004

Sunday, February 29, 2004

Bridger will be hosting a interview with the folks at BHG on "Team Sportcast Network". He is soliciting question that will be posed to the hopefully anywhere from 2-4 members of the development team. So if you have any suggestions for him check out this thread.

Saturday, February 28, 2004

Just wanted to remind everyone that the Rise of Nations Heaven's Scenario design contest has one more week before the deadline. Also remember scripting is optional, so its a pretty each way to win some cash and prizes! Please try to have you submissions in on time, and good luck. Contest details can be found here.

Thursday, February 26, 2004

VE3D_News posts his first impressions of the T&P Marketing Beta: "T&P is essentially 'more of the same,' although that is no bad thing when more of the same equates to excellent strategy gaming." Check out the full article.

Rohag gives us his impressions of the Conquer the World Napoleon Campaign in the upcoming 'Rise of Nations: Thrones & Patriots' in a two-page preview, available at Rise of Nations Empire. Including 7 screenshots.

Great article Rohag!

Wednesday, February 25, 2004

Marcoval a tester at Microsoft is currently putting modem connection issues to the test for the Rise of Nations expack. He is seeking your help and feedback on your Rise of Nations experience (with the original game under patch3) using a modem connection. Check out this thread.

Berlin9487's "World War 2 Wehrmacht 1939" has completed beta testing and is ready for download from either his own site or Rise of Nations Oracle. "Control one of 6 nations during World War 2 Europe, starting in 1939, choose from the Soviet Union, Great Britain, the United States, Germany, and Italy." This scenario streamlines economy by granting wealth every three minutes for cities held. Check out this great scenario.

DevlshOne's Rise of Nations Planet motif now reflects the coming Thrones & Patriots expansion, and the Nations page includes the new nations, powers, and unique units. Check out the new look as well as the updated civ page with the new expack nations.

Big Huge Games is a nominee for the International Game Developers Association (IGDA) Rookie Studio of 2003. "The 4th annual Game Developers Choice Awards ceremony, the premier accolades for peer-recognition in game development, will take place in the Civic Auditorium, San Jose, on Wednesday, March 24, 2004." Check out the nominees and other awards. Also at the IGDA site is a short interview from John Arras of two Colemans about setting into the Gaming industry, and on Modding for Rise of Nations. A good read for those aspiring game designers. Check out the special report.

Previewer Chris Hudak reprises T&P information and promises a full review after the game ships, "Assuming, of course, that we can wrench our multiplayer axes, bayonets and cruise missiles out of each other's backs long enough to write it." The article has 27 screenshots, which appears to be a collection of existing pictures from assorted sources. You can read the preview here.

Rise of Nations has won the Wargamer.com 2003 Readers'Choice Gold Award (#1) in the RTS category "by a widemargin." Check out the full article here. But just missed it for the hotly contested Developer's catagory. You can read about that here.

MFO has updated their screenshots thread to now feature the Dutch unique light ships and their armed merchants,caravans and supply wagons. Plus they also have a new feature of the 3 known wonders. Check that out here.

Thanks to MFO's RFC_Morrigu for the headsup!

Monday, February 23, 2004

We now have a new staff member joining us at Rise of Nations Heaven. He will helping us out with our unit section, which is sorely in need of an update. For this daunting task, he is also promoted to Angel rank. Congrats and please welcome our latest Angel.

Sunday, February 22, 2004

LordCirone makes the Japanese Zero Fighter truly unique! He has created a Mod that will make the Zero, a unit already unique to the Japanese Civilization, a unique unit, with modified stats and its own icon. Download it at our Mod Download section.

Find three screenshots of the new Conquer the World provincial map at Rise of Nations:T&P Universe. Features the focused views of North American, Europe and South West Asia. Check them out at their forum.

HalfLotus: "A key to efficient RTSing is spending resources, and spending them wisely. Sometimes you end up in unique situations and you have to change things up. This is mostly an example to newer/inter players who do the same tech order every game regardless of circumstances, and suffering from it." A sample instructive recorded game illustrating "on the fly" adjustments. Check out the forum thread.

Friday, February 20, 2004

Here's a demo game download illustrating El_Capitan's Greek Medieval Power Raid - El_Capitan's Greeks vs. TuF_wown's Japanese. You can find it at Rise of Nations Universe's download. Find a full discussion of the strategy at Out4Blood's blog.

Previewer Allen "Delsyn" Rausch: "Imagine adding more stuff to a game already so loaded down with features that even diehard fans haven't fully explored it yet. Assuming the quality of Thrones and Patriots evencomes close to the original (and it's looking pretty sweet), Rise of Nations fans should get ready to put their lives on hold again come April 28th." Check out the full article here. Article also includes 20 screenshots!

Just a reminder for those entering Rise of Nations Universe's Recorded Game & Contributor Contest, the deadline is Mar 6, 2004. Vote for your favorite recorded game here and favorite contributor in this thread.

The Kiwis are organizing a Rise of Nations tournament along the lines of the Rugby World Cup. You can get the details and participate in the discussion at the Kiwi forum or at Rise of Nations Universe.

The KBS Clan, in collaboration with any good player willing to help, is offering a game clinic for Rise of Nations newbies. Have a visit with them on their clan forum and hopefully it may improve your game!

As part of GameSpy's series asking designers what games they're playing, Brian Reynolds reveals his current addictions, "...apart from the utterly obvious pastime of getting my butt kicked by Microsoft play testers at Rise of Nations: Thrones and Patriots and our secret next game...." Check out the full article here.

Reviewer Jim McHugh (who confesses his review of Rise of Nations "has been put on the backburner for quite some time"): "In wrapping things up with Rise of Nations I have to admit that the game was much more entertaining than I ever would have imagined. While the graphics may be dated, the versatile gameplay more than made up for it." Check out the full article here.

Previewer Michael Knutson: "From what I can tell from this beta version, this expansion pack is going to blow your socks off. With new additions, gameplay improvements, and many other things, you will not take this game out of your CD drive for a long time!" Check out the full article here.

Tuesday, February 17, 2004

After some consideration, I have decided that we will extent the deadline for the Enlightenment Age Scenario Contest by 1 week. So the new deadline will be March 7, 2004. Also a clarification about the scenario design. Many have had issues creating scenarios because of the scripting involved. While it is a challenge for the non-programmer, there is no stipulation in this scenario design contest that there needs to be any scripting involved. So you are free to create a scenario which is simply using the regular game engine and skirmish battle victory conditions, and simply lay out the units, buildings and landscapes to recreate a historical battle using the scenario editor (which is simple drag and drop). This shouldn't be too difficult as far as technical skills. So its just up to your imagination what you want to put in to create an interesting battle. So get designing and Good luck!

Since many people out there have NVIDIA cards and many have encountered this problem, these new drivers could be worth mentioning in the news. See this thread.

This new set from Forceware not only sorts out everything but is faster and more stable for all games. A big problem that stopped a lot of people playing is now gone. Check out guru3d or techconnect sites for the drivers.

We have just updated the Thrones and Patriots at Rise of Nations Heaven. The info page now contains all the latest info we know about the expack, including the 6 nations, their powers and unique units. The New Wonders and their powers, as well as the details on the government feature. Plus we have opened up two new image galleries. One for the official Thrones and Patriots Screenshots and Artwork released as part of the fansite kit, plus our very own RONH Gallery of screenshots (featuring this week, the Americans as they go from Gunpowder to Info Age).

Rise of Nations Revolution's Loco, Orion, and Néo launch the first in a series of articles on opening strategies in Rise of Nations with a description and analysis of an Age 1 Kamikaze Rush (French). A sample recorded game accompanies theessay. Check it out here.

Tilla the Hun has discovered that, although the maximum number of unit types is hard-coded into the Rise of Nations .exe, "blanking...redundant duplicate units" can "free up about 15-20 unit slots." His personal mod includes a Titan Bomber that drops a nuke. Check out the discussion thread at our own forum.

Jedianakinsolo has posted an essay on launching a powerful Classical Age attack with the Spanish by staying in the Ancient Age longer. You can check out this strategy and discuss its merits at the Rise of Nations Universe forum here.

Subscribers to GameSpot Complete can view a 7:42 minute interview with BHG Executive Producer Tim Train where he discusses the development process of Rise of Nations: Thrones & Patriots. Check out the interview here.

Saturday, February 14, 2004

Out4Blood gives his assessment on a host of changes in the Thrones & Patriots expack. Including a brief summary of what has been done to update the existing nations, his impressions on the new wonders, governments and also the American civ. Check out his blog here.

Friday, February 13, 2004

"The Seventh Annual Awards [of the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences (AIAS)] will be given in Las Vegas, Nevada on March 4th, 2004. These peer-based awards are dedicated to recognizing the outstanding products, talented individuals and development teams that have contributed to the advancement of the $30 billion worldwide entertainment software industry."

Rise of Nations is a finalist in the following categories:- Overall Game of the Year- PC Game of the Year- Innovation in PC Gaming- PC Strategy

Out4Blood is also among the recipients of the "Rise of Nations:Thrones & Patriots" Marketing Beta recently sent out by Graham Somers (BHG's Community Relations Manager), and he takes up the intriguing national ability of the Lakota to build outside their borders in unclaimed territory. Check out the (February 13th entry) on his blog, you can also participate in the discussion on this strategy in this thread.

Nox jumped into the T&P Marketing Beta with a Quickmatch game featuring the above nations in a diplomatic setup. "Because Lakota territory does not appear, one would say it's neutral territory. Send a merchant to exploit a resource in apparently neutral territory, he sets up and...Poof! Attrition: I was in Lakota land." (Nox' essay is in French.) But you can get on bablefish and check out his article here.

Microsoft Games has put together a Thrones & Patriots Expansion Pack site. The site includes descriptions of the 6 new nations, 4 New Conquer the World Campaigns, and the new government types. Also features a screenshot of the week. This week features a beautiful shot of a battle within an Indian or maybe Persian City with elephants (Gun Mahouts) units in the fray.

Thursday, February 12, 2004

MrFixitOnline and Big Huge Games are sponsoring a "Random Offensive Nations Tournament" on March 6th and 7th. First Place takes $250 and a "Thrones & Patriots" expansion beta. Check out the full details here.

Just a reminder for all of your aspiring scenario designers, The deadline for the design contest at Rise of Nations Oracle is fast apporaching, just a few days left. That's Feb 15th. Check out the contest details here.

Our own Napoleonic Era Scenario design contest also isn't far behind, the deadline for that is Feb 29th. Check out the contest details here.

1UP's Ivan Sulic previews Rise of Nations: Thrones & Patriots in his own inimitable way ("...all my notes read like the babblings of a possessed kindergardener"). He concludes, "The focus right now is getting the $30Thrones and Patriots expansion out to stores this spring. We'll have a full review when that happens. To save time, I'll go ahead and jump the gun and say the score will be between 7.5 and 9.5." Check out the full article here.

Tuesday, February 10, 2004

Gamespot offers up a two page preview of thr Rise of Nations Thrones and Patriots Expansion Pack. Article has 17 screen shots which include pictures of the Dutch fighting with Iroquois, a couple of American Battle Scenes, an Indian Wonder, a couple of American, Dutch and Persian City scenes, a new Conquer the World Map, and Startup screen for the 6 nations. Here's an excerpt:

Thrones & Patriots will include, among other things, six new playable nations, including the Iroquois, the Lakota, the Persians, the Dutch, the Americans, and the Indians. Like in the original game, each nation will have different themes, special abilities, and unique units. According to executive producer Tim Train, the new nations won't just serve as generic content additions. They'll actually have abilities that modify the core game and may even require seasoned veterans to take a second look at their favorite strategies.

Monday, February 9, 2004

Mr.FixitOnline.com have just announced the Random Offensive Nations Tournament sponsored by Big Huge Games, to take place March 6 and 7. A total of $1000 is up for grabs, along with 8 copies of the Thrones and Patriots beta, the upcoming expansion to Rise of Nations! Visit the tournament info page for a complete list of settings, times, and prizes.

This isn't just for fun people, this is for a taste of what's to come!

"Microsoft Game Studios today announced that the award-winning real-time strategy (RTS) game for Windows, Rise of Nations®, is now available at local retailers for an estimated retail price of $29.95 (U.S.). Now is the perfect time for gamers to pick up a game at an unbeatable price that has won several major awards, including Game of the Year and Strategy Game of the Year. The price drop comes hot on the heels of the recent announcement that Rise of Nations:Thrones and Patriots is slated for a Spring '04 release, and will allow gamers who haven't yet picked up the original to practice and prepare for this expansion pack.

Saturday, February 7, 2004

General Franks Sums Up The Expack Nations by One_Dead_Angel, 8:20 AM EST

Forum member, General Franks, summarizes the preview of the 6 expack nations from the "Computer Games" magazine, giving us the first details on the nations powers, and Unique Units. Check out this great thread!

Friday, February 6, 2004

Cindy Yans previews "Rise of Nations: Thrones & Patriots" in the March 2004 issue of "Computer Games" print magazine (pages 40-42). The article includes three new screenshots, one of which shows part of the Conquer the World map for the Napoleonic Campaign, and a chart listing the new nations, their powers, and special units. Check out the article here.

HalfLotus and others discuss the value of selling food at the Market to finance booming. Agree or not, this thread highlights the vast range of options open to players who dig into the game mechanics. You can check out this thread here.

Wednesday, February 4, 2004

Gamespy Top 10 Strategy Games of All Time by One_Dead_Angel, 3:10 PM EST

Gamespy has revealed its picks of the Top 10 Strategy Games of All Time. It placed RON as the 8'th best RTS of all time, a great standing for such a recent title!

Here's what they said,

Busting onto the scene in 2003, Rise of Nations is the most recent game on our list, and it stands out on its own. Its experimental gameplay ideas may not have all worked perfectly, but in a genre that has been relatively stagnant it was a breath of fresh air.

Designed by Brian Reynolds (a key player in developing Civilization II and Civil War), Rise of Nations tried to combine the thoughtful play of turn-based empire-building classics with the quick climactic resolutions of real-time games. The rules look and feel like Civilization, but the gameplay plays more like a thoughtful Empire Earth.

Instead of hack-and-slash attacking all the way across the map, you carefully explore and build trade routes to key resources that you try to defend. Once built, your cities remain on the map, exerting a "zone of influence" around them based on your cultural achievements. When you capture an enemy city, you need to have your troops hold it for a couple of minutes before it's "converted" to your own culture's. As a result, the game plays out VERY differently: instead of one giant rush and domination, you fight a series of pivotal wars over key pieces of property. The cycle of Attack! Defend! Consolidate! and the constant balance of cultural development vs. outright warfare make this a unique stand-alone title that more than earns the 8th spot on our countdown.

Gamespot has revealed that Big Huge Games has licensed SpeedTreeRT, a environment design tool for use in a yet un-announced project.

SpeedTreeRT, which was first released by Interactive Data Visualization in December 2002, is a software product that delivers low-polygon, highly realistic trees with adjustable wind effects. The software includes a library of more than 80 different species of tree and also includes a Windows application named SpeedTreeCAD that allows users to create and edit animated trees in real time.

BHG's President Brian Reynolds has a virtual sit-down with Rise of Nations Revolution's Nox to discuss "Rise of Nations: Thrones & Patriots" and more.Check it out in English, here, or in French if you're so inclined.

1Up.com has published a number of screenshots from Rise of Nations' Thrones and Patriots expack. Some old and some new, but make sure to check out the one with the elephant unit in the center of the screen and what looks like the Forbidden City Wonder in the corner.